Chapter 521: Nowhere to Run

Hami City was a small city, but inside the city there was a Governor-General's residence, which belonged to Babai.

Babai was the Turpan Khan's proxy khan in Hami, very young, but truth be told, this khan had been living quite miserably in Hami for the past half year.

The main reason for his misery was faulty intelligence — truth be told, he was nearly dying of hatred for Chai Shihua.

Babai's Chinese was excellent, and his relationship with Chai Shihua, the big boss of smuggling with the Gansu Army, was extremely good; over the years they'd had very deep mutual profit dealings... but Chai Shihua had simply never mentioned to him that Liu Chengzong was the Ming Dynasty's rebel leader, simultaneously the Grand Marshal of the Qinghai Marshal's Headquarters, and also the Simple Khan as well as the Daiching Khitan Khan.

He'd always thought, the hell, that these were four separate powers occupying Qinghai — four different men.

This directly led to the Dzungar tribe and Liu Chengzu arriving at his city walls while he was still mulling over helping Liu Chengzong fight Batur Khong Tayiji... who knew the clown was himself all along; they'd fought and become friends, turned into one family.

If it were only that, it still wouldn't count as miserable for Babai Khan; that would just be a wise man knowing when to bow to circumstances — if you can't beat them, join them. Surrendering is no disgrace.

For a khan, being loved, hated, or feared — none of that matters much. But the one thing he absolutely must not be is ignored, and yet Liu Chengzong had precisely ignored him.

He surrendered, prepared several sets of clothes, planning to show off his years of practiced Chinese before Liu Chengzong's imperial presence and secure a good future for Hami. With the backing of Eastern Chagatai's Turpan and even Yarkent, he had far too many things he could discuss with Liu Chengzong.

Trade routes, tribute, exchanging goods — these were all discussable... If the Choros of the Dzungars could get it done, there was no reason we Borjigin couldn't.

That Han official called Zhou Riqiang rode into the pass in excitement, then rode back out in excitement, and after that the Han army launched a massive conscription and recruitment drive in Hami City, sweeping through like a gust of wind and carrying off every man who could fight and every usable weapon and armor — they didn't even leave the young colts behind.

Then they left.

Not until he was certain the Han army and the Dzungars had no intention of returning did Babai Khan sit in the Governor-General's residence, feeling worse and worse: What about me?

Whether you're the Grand Marshal or the Daiching Khitan Khan, how could you just leave my, Babai Khan's, surrender message on read with no reply?

His mindset shifted. Every day he climbed the walls of Hami City and began his scheduled self-reflection, constantly replaying his own conduct during the Han army's passage. He pondered back and forth for an entire month and, try as he might, couldn't find a single flaw.

He concluded the flaw wasn't with himself, so it had to be with Liu Chengzong.

A full month after Liu Chengzu led his army away from Hami, Babai Khan finally confirmed one thing: he thought he had surrendered, but in reality the Marshal's Headquarters had never accepted his surrender — they had simply, systematically, looted his Hami City clean.

Belatedly realizing this, Babai Khan was so furious he shut the doors of the Governor-General's residence and erupted in curses: This goat-fucking donkey's ballsack actually dared to look down on him!

But anger aside, Babai had no other recourse. Zhou Riqiang had taken nearly all of Hami's soldiers, armor, and weapons; now the trained soldiers in his hands could only form a grand army of twenty men.

The Tianshan Army, born from inland rebels, possessed excellent materiel-collection capabilities. Hami City, turned upside down by them, was left with only two aged blacksmiths, working day and night to forge armor and weapons to supply this grand army.

Compared to armor and weapons that could be reforged, the problem of mounts was clearly far thornier for Babai. His twenty personal guards had searched all of Hami and failed to find a second rideable animal.

In the end, the guard sent to deliver the message to Turpan rode off on Babai's own horse.

Babai had pinned his hopes on his second brother, Aji Khan, who ruled Turpan, sending him reinforcements. But the whole thing turned out to be a dream — Yarkent was in the middle of another internal feud.

This time the infighting was in the Turpan Khanate. Their eldest brother, Abdullah, had been released back by the Yarkent Khan and inherited the khanate at Chalish. The very first thing he did was stabilize the internal situation: he made promises guaranteeing power and position to every brother except Babai Khan.

Relying on the intangible support provided by his brothers, Abdullah exiled a great number of nobles from the previous court, executing over two hundred aristocrats alone. After that, he propped up a batch of nobles who had been overlooked during their father's reign and placed them in control of key state positions.

For a time, the Turpan Khanate was gripped by fear and tension. Let alone the other nobles, even the several royal clan members who supported the Eastern Khan kept their tails between their legs, terrified of inadvertently angering this eldest brother they barely knew.

In his letter to Babai Khan, their second brother Aji Khan urged him not to stir up trouble at this time. Their eldest brother had been taken hostage at the Yarkent Khan's court at age seven and had spent his entire life in Yarkent City; now, past fifty, inheriting the khanate, he was extremely paranoid.

As for the matter of him not receiving any guarantee of power, Aji Khan told Babai not to take it to heart... who could blame their eldest brother, when at the time he returned, Hami had no troops to speak of and had provoked the great monster to the east?

Aji Khan dared not move troops and only sent Babai Khan five hundred horses. Babai was so furious he tore the letter up on the spot: The hell do you mean I provoked them — it's them who shoved my head into the ground and stomped on it!

Facts proved otherwise.

Because right under Babai Khan's nose, a monster had been resurrected. This monster's name was the Chijin Garrison.

The Marshal's Headquarters' Chijin Garrison Commander was called Kang Liangfu, chieftain of the Mongolian Chijin tribe, formerly a headman outside Suzhou Pass, with over two hundred herders of the Chijin tribe under him.

He had received Liu Chengzong's order, supplemented with three hundred Heavenly Soldiers, to rebuild the Chijin Garrison.

This task was not difficult for Kang Liangfu. Three months had passed since Liu Chengzong entered the pass, and outside the pass he had gathered up the Chijin Garrison's old assets, mustering five hundred herders and two hundred horses, combined with three hundred Heavenly Soldiers, to form a horse-and-mule force of eight hundred cavalry. Claiming to be a host of ten thousand, they operated in the Yumen, Guazhou, and Dunhuang areas, pacifying and recruiting the various Hu tribes, carving out seven hundred li of territory beyond Jiayu Pass for the Marshal's Headquarters.

Pacification and recruitment was the easiest job of all. On the Gobi outside the pass, there were no honest, proper common folk. Every able-bodied young man, to a man, was either a horse bandit or a robber, or he was diligently honing his skills in hopes of soon joining a bandit gang.

For no other reason than this: Yumen, Guazhou, and Dunhuang — three territories linked together spanning a full seven hundred li — had fewer than ten thousand people living in them. With that population density, plus the recent years of war and chaos, with Choktu Taiji and Ligdan Khan's great armies and routed soldiers coming and going, what did that mean?

It meant that every person who survived had endured more than enough trials. You see a shepherd tending sheep — he might be a shepherd, or he might be a routed soldier who killed the shepherd and is tending his sheep, or even more likely a routed soldier who killed the shepherd and was then killed by horse bandits, and now the horse bandit is tending the sheep.

But what background these people came from was not important to Kang Liangfu. What was important was that the Grand Marshal who had given him the favor of recognition demanded he pacify and recruit the various Hu, so he would pacify and recruit them.

No matter what they'd been before, as long as they could shoot an arrow: bring twenty men, get a Squad Leader post; bring a hundred men, get a Platoon Leader post; bring two hundred men, get a Company Commander post... just register and that's it. No need to do a thing. Wherever they were before, after registering they could stay right there.

With terms like these, at first the people scraping by on the Gobi weren't even tempted. No food provided, no pay given — what damn use was just a pacification commission certificate? If I take the Grand Marshal's commission certificate and go rob someone, am I gonna get two extra sheep out of it?

Kang Liangfu had no solution either. If people actually brought their bands over, his Chijin Garrison was so poor they'd have to pawn their pants. Liu Chengzong didn't provide for their army provisions anyway, and he couldn't afford to feed them if they came.

But after Liu Chengzong captured the Gaotai Battalion, Kang Liangfu saw the battle-reward spoils the Suzhou Battalion received, and his mind started working. He added one more condition: the Grand Marshal was generous to his troops — if you don't believe it, look at the Suzhou Battalion. They took a city, and every man got rewarded.

The major bandit gangs on the Gobi stirred at the news and flocked in droves to register. Even some solo freelancers came running. In a flash, the Chijin Garrison's troop strength ballooned to nearly four thousand.

Unrestrained fugitive border troops from inside the pass, exiled military households who couldn't endure poverty, Choktu Taiji's Khalkha routed soldiers, down-and-out nobles of the Chahar tribe, Oirat remnant soldiers and stragglers — the sources of troops could truly be called a gathering of heroes.

Among them there was even a bandit leader named He Chong'an, whose bizarre life experience prompted Kang Liangfu to summon him specifically, because this man had been routed by Liu Chengzong twice.

He Chong'an was originally from the Ningxia border army. He first went on campaign with He Huchen to suppress rebels in Yan'an Prefecture as a cavalry squad officer, was defeated and captured at Huanglong Mountain, drank Liu Chengzong's ginger soup, and followed He Huchen back to Ningxia.

After returning, because they needed to recruit new soldiers, he even got promoted and served as a centurion for a while. Pity it didn't last — just when Ligdan Khan came crashing against the border walls, he was leading his men digging out sand, outnumbered and overwhelmed. He'd wanted to lead his squad and break through, but a few enterprising young talents from the Chahar tribe hooked him back with hooked spears, and he became a captive.

Fortunately, he was thoroughly fluent in the Mongolian dialects of the southern desert and got along quite well within the Chahar migration's massive column. Quite a few of the surrendered Tumed were happy to hang around with him.

He followed Ligdan Khan all the way to Qinghai, and when he learned Liu Chengzong was right there in Qinghai, he'd originally thought he could use the barbarians to suppress the bandits — never in his wildest dreams did he expect Ligdan Khan to actually form an alliance with Liu Chengzong. In a fit of rage, he rounded up over thirty surrendered Tumed soldiers, crossed the Qilian Mountains, and rejoined the army in Gansu Garrison — this time his commanding officer was called Zhao Zhirui.

After Liu Chengzong broke through the pass, He Chong'an led a band of remnant soldiers and stragglers adrift in the northern Suzhou Gobi. He'd originally wanted to cross the Alxa Desert and return to Ningxia, but never expected Liu Chengzong's army, fighting and running at the same time, to be faster than their scattered band of deserters. At the edge of the Tengger Desert, they were nearly caught by Zhang Tianlin's patrol troops.

In a fit of rage, He Chong'an led his band back outside Jiayu Pass and turned to banditry.

This time He Chong'an had also figured things out. He reckoned that at this speed, Liu Chengzong would be fighting his way to Ningxia before long. If he joined the Chijin Garrison now, heading home later would be easier. So he led his band to Kang Liangfu's place to register.

He was pretty cocky too — came and even laid out conditions to Kang Liangfu. After all, he was someone Liu Chengzong had beaten back in the Lion Camp days, so he spoke with a hard edge: "These are all good hands I've got. You have to provide army provisions."

Kang Liangfu laughed the moment he heard this: "Take a look — which of the ones who've come to me isn't a good hand? That one-eyed man was a commander of a thousand in the Mongol Great Khan's Kheshig; that cripple was the State Preceptor Khan's Koshuchi. What use is it? None of them have grain to eat either."

"I know you're all men of ability, but truth be told, none of your abilities are all that great. If your ability really reached the heavens, right now I'd be the one writing you letters begging for grain and fodder."

Kang Liangfu didn't shut the door completely. After saying all this, he smiled and added: "Still, you're the only Han troop leader on the Gobi. I'll write you a letter — deliver it yourself to Ganzhou for Commander Cao. Army provisions are definitely out of the question, but you might just be able to get yourself some official post or rank in the regular army."

Kang Liangfu dared not offend someone from the Ningxia border army background; it cost him nothing to do a favor. After all, Dai Daozi, who'd gone to the Tianshan Mountains, and Ma Xiang, the mounted messenger and close aide at the Grand Marshal's side, were both border soldiers from Ningxia.

But before He Chong'an could set out, an urgent letter really did come from the direction of Hami to the north, meant to be forwarded by the Chijin Garrison to Ganzhou. Kang Liangfu had no choice but to bring He Chong'an along and make a special trip to Ganzhou.

The letter was written by Liu Chengzu. Whatever the contents, to Kang Liangfu it was a top-priority secret missive — there was no way he'd let a newly surrendered straggler like He Chong'an escort such a letter.

The party arrived at Ganzhou, and Kang Liangfu very easily brought He Chong'an to see Cao Yao at the Commander's residence. At that moment, Cao Yao was utterly swamped and stressed over frontline military affairs.

He also couldn't figure out how Liu Chengzong had fought this battle. Wang Ziyong, stationed on the front line at Yongchang, sent word that several groups of Ming army stragglers had appeared in the mountains southwest of Liangzhou — they moved fast, charged fiercely, and even marched and formed ranks with considerable discipline. They looked hard to suppress.

Right now those stragglers had been milling about at the foot of the mountains, and Wang Ziyong had no idea what they were actually trying to do.

Cao Yao stood in the Commandant's residence, studying the map from every angle. He figured that no matter how Liu Chengzong's battles at Gulang Gorge and the Zhuanglang River had gone, stragglers should not have appeared there. It puzzled him greatly.

No matter how he racked his brain, he could never have imagined that in those mountains, his own clansman Cao Wenzhao was holed up deep in the old forest, locked in a battle of wits with thin air.

Cao Wenzhao was even more baffled than he was. According to his plan, after making such a long detour, the spot where they emerged was the only route between Liangzhou and Yongchang. With the thunder of cannon fire at Gulang Gorge, the front line was clearly locked in fierce fighting — they should have come out right on top of Liu Chengzong's supply line.

Instead, when his scouts slipped out of the mountains, they reported that the forts outside were completely deserted. Cao Wenzhao suspected a trap, so he didn't dare charge out blindly. He first sent small mounted squads to roam around outside.

The intelligence they brought back was even more alarming. The mounted squads had ridden back and forth across fifty li in every direction and hadn't seen a single soul — as if the place were haunted.

It was this standoff across empty space that had left Cao Yao restless these past two days. When he saw Kang Liangfu arrive with the Han troops, he was in no good mood, and even frowned as he leafed through Liu Chengzu's letter.

The letter's content was nothing special — Liu Chengzu was just asking how the battle here was going and, in passing, relaying intelligence that the Oirat were preparing for war.

But when Cao Yao read the latter part of the letter, his brow instantly smoothed. He clapped his hands and said, "Excellent! War is excellent!"

The region north of the Tianshan Mountains was remote, far from the reach of any emperor. As far as Cao Yao was concerned, as long as Liu Chengzu's Han troops were safe, whatever the Oirat chieftains wanted to do over there was their business — he couldn't control it and didn't even care to know.

But if Baatur Khung Taiji was going to make a big move, he would need the Marshal's headquarters to provide equipment support according to their agreement. In exchange for this support, Liu Chengzu wrote in the letter, Baatur Khung Taiji was preparing a large quantity of goods as promised.

These included fifty thousand sheep, five thousand horses, and one thousand head of cattle.

It was a very long letter, but this single line made Cao Yao beam with delight. It wasn't that he was greedy — he simply had a fondness for small animals.

The entire army of the Marshal's headquarters was also very fond of small animals. This letter meant that this year, every soldier of the Marshal's headquarters would receive their very own little lamb. And a Marshal's soldier plus a little lamb — that solved every problem.

Cao Yao was grinning from ear to ear when he finally noticed Kang Liangfu hadn't left. He raised a hand and said, "Ah, perfect, you're still here…"

"Commandant, his name is He Chong'an. He's surrendered to Chijin Guard." Kang Liangfu thought he'd finally found a chance to speak, and added quietly, "Ningxia border army, and an officer at that."

Cao Yao furrowed his brow and looked at He Chong'an. He didn't believe a word of it, punctuation marks included. Ningxia border army, Chijin Guard — what proper officer would run all the way beyond Jiayu Pass?

But right now he couldn't care less about those questions. He reached over and pulled the map toward him, pointed at the location of Hami, and looked up at He Chong'an. "Border army officer — you know military law?"

Once He Chong'an nodded, Cao Yao said, "Fine. You are temporarily appointed to the post of Assistant Commander of Chijin Guard. As for your men…"

He turned to Kang Liangfu and said, "Go occupy Hami. Seal off the western route. Before next year, not a single bird from Turpan is to fly across. Understood?"

Kang Liangfu nodded dizzily as Cao Yao turned back to He Chong'an. "Rank Four Principal Assistant Commander of the guard — in charge of drilling troops and military discipline. When occupying Hami, the army must be strictly restrained. Do it well, and no matter what you did before, after the campaign I, Cao, will petition the Grand Marshal for your commendation and make your provisional appointment as Assistant Commander of Chijin Guard permanent."

"Do it poorly — hmph! You ran all the way here from Ningxia, so you're quite the runner… but you're certainly no match for me. I ran here from Liaodong. So this time, if you do it poorly, don't make me go to the trouble of hunting you down. Just slit your own throat. You won't get away."

Good morning!